Tuesday, July 26, 2011

The Hallway Light

Oh where to begin....

A brief background.... When Stephen and I moved into this house we wanted to paint. I chose to paint our house a beautiful blue with one darker blue accent wall. I bought throw pillows, couch covers, wall art.... and about six months later I changed my mind.... We were painting our offices and Stephanie had brought in Cracker Bitz a pretty brown in the gold family or pretty gold in the brown family :0) I loved it and decided that I wanted it in my house so Stephen painted our downstairs gold with red accent walls. ( My husband probably wanted to kill me for having him paint our living room/kitchen and this time the stairwell and hallway upstairs.... Well as hard as my husband tried WE ARE NOT PAINTERS!!!! So a year later we were FINALLY financially able to hire some professionals to "touch up" his hard work. WELL...when we painted the last time we had red and brown paint leftover so it was easy to go get more paint, however we used all the gold.... we spent our Sunday afternoon at Lowes with the helpful paint expert trying to find the same color ( I even text Stephanie to see if she remembered the color). Enter Cracker Bitz, I was so excited it looked right on and I was siked for the painters to come on Monday. Stephen took off Monday so he could be there with the painters, (Premier Painting) I came home to an amazing stairwell and hallway! I knew the ceiling spots wouldn't be the exact same color, but what I'm not so pleased with is the gold touch-ups, it completely looks like a different color around the edges. The painters said this was because the other paint had been on the walls for a year and it would take time to blend... I'm hoping...

Anyway... [to the post title] when the painters left the hallway was still wet so they didn't put back up the sconce. This afternoon Stephen and I ate dinner, and were planning on going to the gym (it's our new thing). I said, hey babe why don't we try to put the sconce up first... Insert the next hour putting up ONE light fixture. The light is HIGH up in our stairwell so I suggested to Stephen to get our kitchen chair put two legs on one stair and prop the other two legs up with books :0) well he nixed that idea. However, he did go get some books and managed to put the left screw and bottom screw in. YAH!! Now to the right (which of course the stairs are higher on the left side) So Stephen and I start brainstorming.... Somehow he decided its much safer for me to be on his shoulders than to do my clever chair idea. So here we go, when I get nervous I laugh, now was not the time to laugh climbing up on my husband's shoulders in the stairwell. TAKE 1... FAIL... TAKE 2... FAIL... TAKE 3 FAIL... TAKE 4 FAIL... now my husband is sweating, I'm laughing and we have NO clue how we are getting this last screw on. Stephen FINALLY agrees to let me try my chair idea :0) YES, I can reach the the fixture, I got the screw, AND I drop it in the base of the sconce... YES I'm serious... So, we have to take the two other glorious screws back out, get the screw I dropped out and after a little more frustration MISSION SUCCESSFUL!!
(whew, that was my gym time) I told by husband I was going to blog, while he goes to the gym, but he didn't leave without me reminding him that it is indeed double punch Tuesday :0)







Amanda BURTON

Sunday, July 10, 2011

The Dirty 30

This past week has been craziness!! I've been feeling/being behind at work, and on top of that, came down with a (i'm guessing) viral bug on Wednesday, fever and horrid horrid headache :0(

This was also the weekend I planned my parents 30th wedding anniversary party. Late Thursday night my fever broke and I woke up Friday feeling like a new person. :0) However, due to being sick... Friday was the only day I had to SHOP along with doing a few VERY necessary things for work... After wearing myself D O W N Friday night Stephen and I both crashed!!! Waking to a rash on the day of my parents party.. (this viral bug is hard to kick) :0(

50 -60ish people came Saturday to celebrate my parents 30th wedding anniversary. Running around like "a chicken with my head cut off" totally paid off and was completely worth it. After all my parents have done for me, they totally deserved this a more...

And... celebrating wedding's my Best Friend Nikki and her boyfriend Drew got engaged on Friday morning. BEST WISHES to my gal and her man!!

Trying to keep a simple Sunday, kick this viral rash and prepare for the work week ahead!!


Amanda BURTON

Saturday, July 2, 2011

The Case Of The Two Manda's

Okay, so anyone who knows me, knows I'm just head OVER heals for my nephews. I mean, how could I not be? Have you seen them?!?

When I started dating Stephen, Hunter was (4) and Brody was (1 month). Hunter and I slowly develop our bond, I never wanted to force a bond with him faster than he was comfortable with... Being (4) Hunter will remember "life" before "Aunt Amanda". Brody, he'll know no life without me :0)

We see the other "Burton" half most every weekend, and my HEART and my HEAD have been swelling up so BIG hearing how much Brody is/ has been talking about his Mandas, I mean it just makes my heart melt!!! Well, 2 weeks ago.... WE ALL realized I'm not the ONLY Mandas in his life. My husband is also Mandas!! Yes, it's true... I was getting double the Manda's because he was referring to Stephen and I both :0) 0h well, ( I'm secretly still pleased it's my name and not Stephen's) and at least Brody knows who's wearing the pants in our relationship ;)


My 1st picture with Hunter
"Uncle" Mandas and "Aunt" Mandas with Brody
Uncle Stephen with Hunter

Amanda BURTON





Friday, July 1, 2011

Living Learning Loving

I'm an avid blog reader!!! Blogger myself ? probably not, but I'll give it a shot.

Like I said avid blog reader over here, from adoption blogs (more on that latter) to "mommy blogs" to interior decorating blogs I'm hooked!

While I make no promise of anything of interest said here, I hope to document my days in the life as a Burton. Why Burton? because I'm a newlywed (insert aww). and love the sound of being a Burton and being linked to my husband in this way.. Plus with all the RED TAPE to make it offical I deserve to wear my "new" name out!! :) Okay, back to my husband, the man that said "I do". Stephen, we met ALMOST two years ago while I was [interning] at his "then" job. Our relationship fastly developed... dating for 3 months, living together at 4 , engaged at 6 and married at 13 months .. whew!! bout time for my life to calm down.. Most people say their signficant other is their better half, their rock etc..etc.. In our case Stephen is all that mushyness and more he's my sain half, he keeps me grounded, is there when my brain races ahead of my body and our pockets, :) he is my eternal optimist and my rational thinker. Me? I'm the idea racer, the let's do it now girl, the pessimist, and the spender...

So here we are two newlyweds taking a step into the world and the wonderful/craziness of being 24 and 25, married, homeowners, career social workers, and the fun aunt and uncle to the MOST precious two boys on the planet.

While I hope to one day feel up my days and posts with my children's funny antic's I am happy to keep it simple and tell about the days in the life as a Burton...


Amanda BURTON